Three mediapersons held for extortion

Three mediapersons have been arrested for allegedly attempting to extort Rs 5 lakh from a BIM (Unani) doctor in east Delhi’s Mayur Vihar, police said on Saturday.

Himanshu Tiwari, 29, a freelance reporter, Sachin Mishra, 33, information technology manager with India TV, and Saurabh Tripathi, a system administrator with India TV were held after a complaint by Dr Mahesh Kumar who runs a clinic at Mandawali.

He alleged that they had made a video of his clinic wherein he was shown attending patient and prescribing allopathic medicine.

He also claimed that the accused were threatening and demanding Rs 5 lakh from him for more than a month.

On Friday, the trio was called to Jeevan Anmol Hospital in Mayur Vihar Phase-I to take delivery of Rs 1.5 lakh in exchange of a pendrive containing the footage.

“Saurabh was caught red handed and others were arrested at his instance,” a senior police official said.

Himanshu was also identified by Mahesh as he had visited the clinic previously to extort money.

He is the main conspirator who had made the video and planned the entire operation.